Friday, May 11, 2012

KILLER'S KISS (1955)

A washed-up boxer lives in a low rent apartment and although he knows better, he gets involved with a local taxi dancer who's nothing but bad news. She's not a bad person, but the thug who owns the taxi dance hall she works at has the hots for her and he's not above sexually assaulting women or having his men beat the crap out of anybody who gets in his way.

KILLER"S KISS is rough around the edges and a little slow to start, but when you consider Director/Writer/Editor/Cinematographer/Producer Stanley Kubrick was only 26 when he made this film with $40 grand he borrowed from his uncle (that's one hell of an uncle!) it's quite a remarkable film, especially when you compare it to other micro-budget Noirs of the time. BLAST OF SILENCE I'm looking at you motherfucker, but not for too long cause I'll fall asleep. Also Kubrick was smart enough (although it was probably related to the low budget) to keep the entire thing a tight 67 minutes instead of padding it out.

But is it worth watching? Ehh, probably not. If you want to see Kubrick's beginnings to compare to the masterpieces he would make just a few years later then yes, but you're not really missing anything if you decide to skip it. If you only got time to watch one 67 minute film noir in your life then I say watch DETOUR instead.

Also on a side note: if you're interested in learning more about taxi dance halls then check out the Amazon link below for "The Taxi-Dance Hall: A Sociological Study in Commercialized Recreation and City Life". I've heard that it's a really good book and I would love to read it, but $30 is a little too rich for me.